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GLASS MEMORY - A TALK WITH ITALIAN ARTIST SANDRO MARTINI

2012-11-19

Date:

11/19/2012

Maeci

On the occasion of the completion of Glass Memory, his most recent work for the lobby of the Burano Building, Italian artist Sandro Martini will engage in a conversation with Vladimir Spicanovic, Dean of the Faculty of Art at OCAD University.

Milan-based artist Sandro Martini has been responsible for the outfitting of the lobby of the Burano Building at Bay and Grosvenor. This huge, colourful work is made of frescoed walls and huge etched glass panels. He started planning and working on this extraordinary project five years ago.

“In his Milan studio, he painted 30 panels and etched 6 glass sheets, in total weighing hundreds of kilograms. He couldn’t see the whole work until he came to Toronto, where he assembled and completed the 28-metre-by-8-metre project.[…] His work at Burano, now viewable via a public right-of-way, is absolutely breathtaking. The eye uncovers a landscape cracked by lines and lightning. Two walls flank a space lying fallow—a place where the colours surrender, where the mind ceases to fight. Sandro Martini’s work is an outstanding contribution to a city of the future using a technique of the past”. (Corrado Paina, Canadian Art, 18.9.2012. For the complete article see: http://www.canadianart.ca/news/2012/09/18/martini/).

BioSandro Martini was born on April 21, 1941 in Livorno (Tuscany- Italy). Since 1957 he has received acknowledgements for his work with awards and publications of reviews on newspapers. At 17 he was commissioned to complete reliefs to the new Synagogue in Livorno by the Architect Andrea di Castro. In these years he made sculptures on wood and iron. In 1960 he moved to Milan. In 1962 Le Ore was the first gallery to exhibit his works. An exclusive collaboration with the gallery began. Other collaborations with important galleries followed: in 1967 Il Milione, in 1975 La Galleria Blu. From 1977 Sandro Martini began his experience abroad with an exhibition in Paris (Gallerie NRA – presented by Marcelin Playnet). The following year he had a personal exhibition at the Fine Art University of Massachusetts. Since then he has been travelling from his studios in New York, San Francisco and Milan. Toronto has granted him another prestigious acknowledgement with the recent permanent installation Glass Memory at the Burano Building to which Martini has dedicated five years between planning and building.